Photos: A Mother & Daughter Staycation in San Jose, California

As the new school year quickly approaches, I thought to take my daughter on a short weekend “staycation.” We had our sights set on the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk but due to excessive traffic, we avoided the clogged mountain highway and planted ourselves at the historic Hayes Mansion hotel in San Jose. As you can see in the photo, it’s a gorgeous example of late 19th-century Mediterranean Revival architecture.

After we checked in, we were surprised and delighted to come across an amazing Indian wedding procession happening on the hotel grounds.

Later, a quick search of local events led us to the Santa Clara County Fair, where we saw all kinds of interesting things. (You may remember that we recently visited the Alameda County Fair.)

We spotted wacky anthropomorphic corn dog art.

There was entire booth dedicated to making Slush Puppies.

At this fair, deep-fried peaches are the specialty.

A young man named William had entered his duct tape and cardboard dog into the Creative Arts & Crafts exhibit and won first place.

Then we came across this, an Old Southwestern Fun Photos booth…

And there was all kinds of cool props inside the booth.

And then this happened.

Here’s a look at all of the weekend’s images.

photos by Rusty Blazenhoff except the last one, which was taken by Rosalind Hance of Old Southwestern Fun Photos